Free The Last Sherlock Holmes Story by Michael Dibdin

and in another instant we were rattling back the way we had come. But if I thought that Holmes’s repertoire of surprises was now exhausted, Iwas sadly mistaken. When we were better than half way to our destination, the cab happened to be held up for a moment by a blockage of traffic. With a cry of ‘Come, Watson!’ Holmes leapt into the road. Ignoring the cabbie’s shouts, I followed suit, and after a narrow escape from being crushed under a brewer’s dray I reached safety just in time to see my friend disappearing into the Portland Road railway station. § After thirty-five smelly and noisy minutes underground, we emerged into the light of day once more on the Embankment. Holmes now led me at an unrelenting pace through a maze of alleys and passages. We entered a prestigious hotel through the front door and left via the kitchens, and then reversed this procedure with an equally famous military club. After a long sequence of this feinting, we finally came to rest in the pastoral serenity of St James’s Park.
    If Holmes wished to calm his nerves and regain his composure, he could have chosen no more suitable place. St James’s Park is, without doubt, the most reassuring place on earth to an Englishman. There one sits in what resembles nothing so much as a bigger and better garden of childhood, surrounded by ducks and trees and quiet walks, walled in by the massive edifices lining Whitehall and the Mall – and ever calmly conscious of the great house to the west, from which the Empire’s supreme parent keeps watch over the doings of her scattered family.
    ‘You are a stout fellow, Watson, and a true soldier,’ said Holmes at last. ‘Nothing is as valuable as a friend who is content to follow without asking the reason why. You realised, no doubt, that we were being dogged.’
    ‘I thought as much. But by whom?’
    ‘Can you not guess?’
    ‘Not I.’
    ‘His tradename, as he himself puts it, is Jack the Ripper.’
    ‘Holmes!’
    I was stunned. A hundred questions sprang up at once in my mind, demanding answers. How had Holmes identified the killer? Who was he? Why had the police not been informed? What dire purpose had he in following us about London?
    ‘You saw him, then, through the window?’
    ‘Exactly.’
    ‘But where was he, Holmes?’
    ‘Have you noticed that one of the houses almost opposite our rooms has been standing empty for some time? He was there, at the first-floor windows. I happened to glance over, and there stood the very man who was at that moment uppermost in my thoughts. It was, as you may imagine, an unpleasant surprise. He was watching our rooms, Watson! He must know that I am on his trail. It is a major setback. I had hoped to have the advantage of him – to know, and not be known. No doubt it was a vain hope with such a man. But I shall have to watch my step very carefully from now on. We are dealing with one of the three most dangerous criminals in Europe.’
    ‘But who is he?’ I broke out impatiently. ‘Who is Jack the Ripper?’
    Holmes was silent for a moment. Then he shot a glance at me.
    ‘You have probably never heard of Professor Moriarty?’
    ‘Never.’
    ‘Aye, there’s the genius and the wonder of the thing!’ he laughed bitterly. ‘The man pervades London, and no one has ever heard of him. That’s what puts him on a pinnacle in the records of crime. In those annals, eminence is measured not by how many people are aware of one, but by how few. Notoriety is a sure sign ofincompetence. It is a point which is generally missed by the public and the press alike. Mention great criminals and they think of such men as Palmer and Peace. ¶ But Palmer and Peace were hanged. The truly great criminal remains unknown. His deeds float free of him, unattached, like natural events. The perfect crime exists, Watson, but a necessary concomitant of its perfection is that we do not know who committed it. If we did, we should recognise behind many perfect crimes the hand of the